Restaurant review: Fajitas for Iftar Gamal Nkrumah takes to tortillas, tacos and enchiladas Try tortilla today. There are only two days left for Ramadan -- today and tomorrow. This is your last chance to try a delicious Mexican delicacy for Iftar. Mind you, you can still go for a Mexican feast over the Eid Al-Fitr, though not quite the same menu. Cantina Laredo, the elegant authentic Mexican restaurant in the heart of the ghastly CityStars Mall dominates the star-spangled skyscrapered skyline of frightful Nasr City, Cairo's concrete jungle par excellence. The mall is expressly meant for teenagers and Gulf Arab tourists. Youngsters loiter about, but I can assure you they come nowhere near Cantina Laredo. They tend to congregate around the notorious Cinnabon and other such eateries. Gourmet Mexican food is rather hard to find in Cairo. Cantina Laredo, however, comes closest to gourmet Mexican dishes. There is an Egyptian twist, however, to the taste. Don't expect to order portbello mushrooms drenched in chipotle wine, but you can savour the tempting tastes of Mexico in the quesadillas corn tortilla (stuffed unleavened bread made of ground corn). The stuffing might not be quite like that of Mexico, more akin to the Tex-Mex cuisine of Mexican-Americans -- Americanised Mexican food. The tortilla soup at Cantina Laredo was nondescript and the Agua de Jamaica turned out to be none other than karkadey, the traditional hibiscus drink of Egypt and Sudan. Cantina Laredo, with 65 years as a restaurant chain and 35 years of worldwide franchise experience, is family- oriented and children-friendly. This is the first time it has opened in Egypt. The hallmark of Cantina Laredo is the internationalisation of Mexican gourmet cuisine. And, Cantina Laredo is the progenitor of the Mexican cuisine in Cairo and its intense flavours of tropical and alpine bounties -- avocado, tomato, corn, chocolate and subtle herbs -- all indigenous to Mexico. There was, much to my surprise, a special children's menu, complete with games and crayons for colouring. "Dip the chip" is an exciting maze where your children can trace how their favourite tortilla chip can find the bowl of salsa. They can also "build a taco", another alluring game in which the child unscrambles letters to find the ingredients that make a taco. Believe you me, children will be kept busy at Cantina Laredo. There is the little kids menu and the big kids menu. The little kids menu includes corndog, enchilada, finger-licking chicken fingers, crispy taco and grilled cheese. These dishes are served with rice and beans (Mexican-style, of course) or French fries. The big kids menu, meant for growing lads with healthy appetites, includes fajita nachos, fajita quesadillas and fajita stuffed with either chicken or beef. For the less adventurous there is the choice of a huge chicken breast roasted Mexican-style. All kids meals are served with a beverage, the sugar-saturated soft drink variety. The tamarind and hibiscus drinks were syrupy sweet, too. The Ramadan menu was rather filling and not particularly Ramadan-oriented. Manager Sameh Al-Aasa assured me that the menu would be similar over the Eid period. "The only difference is that you enjoy set menus for Iftar, while throughout the Eid you are free to pick and choose what combination of Mexican culinary delights you fancy," he explained. Being the carnivore that I am, I opted for Meat Lovers Meal introduced by the regulatory tortilla soup cup and the chimchurri or fajita salad. I was spoilt for choice. I toyed with the idea of Carne Asada or Camaron Poblano Asada. I settled for the latter. For those who prefer chicken there were plenty of options: Camarones Escondidos, Tampico and Pollo Chipotle. The dessert was Mexican flan which I washed down with Horchata. For those interested in traditional Mexican specialties there are soft tacos, enchiladas, durango, manzanillo and fajitas galore. As far as I was concerned, Carne Asada was the piece-de-resistance. I ordered mine medium-rare. I like it so. My partner was horrified and asked the waiter to take it back; she liked her meat well-done. To our surprise, the waiter was exceptionally polite and returned 10 minutes later with a larger slab of meat, notwithstanding the fact that my partner had nibbled away about a third of her steak. The waiter was courteous in spite of her incessant and bitter complaints. Niceties, after all, are a characteristic of both Mexicans and Egyptians. Cantina Laredo CityStars Mall Nasr City, Cairo Tel: 010 8557 557 Iftar for three: LE220
